The Segway Robot has announced its first alpha developer partners

The Segway Robot has announced its first alpha developer partners

First developer kits sent out

07 March 2017

Amsterdam, March 7, 2017. Loomo, the first robot developed by Segway and Intel, has announced after thousands of applicants, its new alpha developer partners as BMW, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Smart Center and Stibo Accelerator.

The announcement took place during CES, a global consumer electronics and consumer technology tradeshow which is held annually during January in Las Vegas. Loomo was first demoed at CES in 2016 and this year was present again show casing its new design.

The latest partnerships pave way for an abundance of opportunities for future developments including personal robotics capabilities for Intel, autonomous driving with BMW, medical purposes for MIT including elderly care, and consumer safety and retail for Stibo Accelerator. Developer kits have been sent out with the ability for the partners to innovate, within their fields of expertise, the software and hardware of Loomo. Segway’s first robot will act as an open platform project to encourage boundless potential for developers to advance Loomo’s capabilities.

Like many of Segway and Ninebot by Segway products, Loomo is a self-balancing transporter, however is powered by an Intel Atom Processor to enable artificial intelligence processing and computation. It has autonomous capabilities with an Intel RealSense camera to enable depth sensing to navigate and face recognition. Additionally, a microphone combined with speakers allows two way communication between users and Loomo, with the robot being able to follow voice commands.

Since the announcement, the MIT Hacking Medicine Robotics hackathon took place in Singapore from February 10th to 12th , using the Segway robot as an open platform for healthcare developers. The focus of the Hackathon was on elderly care and how robotics can have a role in ageing societies. The event had 75 teams, with more than 200 developers, participating to develop the software and hardware of Loomo.

The winning team developed Loomo into an autonomous system to transport patients within nursing homes and elderly care facilities. The concept behind this is to free manpower, allowing nurses and doctors to focus more on critical care of patients.

This development is a step closer for Loomo to progressing into a final prototype within the medical and healthcare profession.